


The Thirst Trap

by CharmingMonsters



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Attempt at Humor, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Thirst Tweets, This got away from me
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-01
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-05-10 10:16:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 19,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14735069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CharmingMonsters/pseuds/CharmingMonsters
Summary: Victor Nikiforov reads Thirst Tweets for a Buzzfeed  video; Yuuri is anonymously quoted and wants to die. Phichit makes sure everyone is properly hydrated.





	1. Buzzfeed Presents: The Mortification and Death of Katsuki Yuuri

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be a quick, funny 3-part fic but then ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ 
> 
> This fic is set during the GPF qualifier competitions leading up to the Sochi GPF from the anime, aligning with the 2015 season in real life. The first competition is Skate America (Milwaukee Oct 23-25, Victor & Phichit competing), which is a six-hour drive from Detroit.
> 
> Un-beta’ed, so please let me know if you spot any significant typos or other errors.

On the bus ride home from the rink, Yuuri pulls up his “Victor Nikiforov” Google alert. He’d had a terrible practice, biffing his quad salchow repeatedly, and only fresh content from his idol can replenish Yuuri’s flagging spirits. Skate Canada is in two weeks – his first GPF event of the season – and if he doesn’t pull himself out of this downward spiral, he’s not going to qualify for the final. Again.

Yuuri hates paparazzi photos, unable to squelch his guilt about Victor’s privacy being invaded just to slake fan thirst, but everything else is fair game. Practice footage and new Instagram selfies were the best, of course, but after six spills on the ice and a fresh bruise the size and shape of Florida blossoming on his hip, Yuuri wasn’t about to be picky.

Two websites had run articles that were basically re-written versions of the ESPN interview from last week, which Yuuri knew because he read them both, just in case either contained some new information. No selfies; Victor’s social media updates were Makkachin-centric and the FFKK was promoting Mila Babechiva today. Yuuri switched to YouTube with a sigh. He’d have to settle for re-watching old interviews to get his daily dose of Vitamin V, as Phichit had taken to calling his completely unsubtle fixation.

There, in the sidebar next to a badly subtitled Russian television appearance from July which had become one of Yuuri’s favorites (thanks largely to Victor’s habit of touching his lips with his fingertip every time the presenter asked a question), was a new suggested video, posted so recently that Google hadn’t had a chance to notice it yet.

_Buzzfeed Presents: Victor Nikiforov reads Thirst Tweets._

Yuuri was roommates with Phichit. In theory, he knew what thirst tweets were. What he didn’t know – and his hands started to tremble as he tucked in his earbuds and clicked “play” – was precisely how explicit said tweets might get.

If Victor said the words _fuck me_ during this video, Yuuri might die right there on the bus.

There he was – Victor! – looking as polished and perfect as ever. His silver hair hung loose over one bright blue eye, and he was wearing a fitted silk shirt that looked both soft and horrendously expensive. Yuuri was momentarily distracted as he noticed that the shirt’s collar was open enough to show a sliver of clavicle, and wound up having to restart the video because he’d completely missed what Victor was saying.

“Now, I expect these will be entirely focused on my skating technique,” Victor said to the camera in a cheerful drawl, his Russian accent thick and ridiculously sexy. “After all, what other reason could my fans have to thirst after me?”

He punctuated this remark with a wink. The Buzzfeed editorial team had helpfully followed this with a montage of Victor’s ass in form-fitting costumes from across the scope of his career. Yuuri blushed and simultaneously pushed down his anger at whoever had chosen the images. They’d left out some of the best ones! A Victor butt collection was absolutely incomplete without the inclusion of the white tuxedo costume he’d worn in the 2012 Stars on Ice European tour, and a part of Yuuri’s brain was busy composing an angry email to this effect as he watched screen!Victor fish through a small red bucket and pull out a piece of paper.

“ _@VictorNikiforov step on me_ ,” he read, a delighted giggle in his voice. “Does this mean while I’m wearing skates or not, I wonder? Although I suppose if I was wearing skate guards, it wouldn’t be too dangerous!”

Yuuri had a moment of absolute terror as he realized the user handle of the tweeter was visible on screen. He hit pause on the video playback and frantically thought about his own social media usage. Had he ever made a remark that could constitute a “thirst tweet”? Especially under his own name?!?

No. Yuuri was careful about things like that. His poor decisions were carefully locked behind username dokidokiniki. Besides, there had to be millions of thirst tweets about Victor online. The odds that one of his would somehow wind up on this – he squinted at the screen – four minute and thirteen second video were infinitesimal.

He hit play again.

“ _Victor Nikiforov? More like Victor Dickmealot am I right?!?_ ” Victor read out the punctuation as well, which gave Yuuri’s heart time to restart.

Was there any way to ask Phichit to make him an audio clip of just the word _dick_? No, not one that would allow Yuuri to retain even the smallest shred of dignity.

Dignity was over-rated.

Screen!Victor was babbling about Russian patronymics, explaining that perhaps if his father’s name had been Richard, you could possibly refer to him as Victor Dickovich, but doing so might be rude and a little weird.

“Next!” he exclaimed, digging in the red bucket for another piece of paper. “Every time Victor does that quad flip with the +2.74 GOE in his short program, my ovaries explode. PS I am a man.”

Yuuri becomes one with the bus seat. There, on the screen, is user name dokidokiniki, proclaiming his physical desire for Victor in a way that Yuuri is reluctant to admit even in the privacy of his own thoughts. Why had he said such a thing? Why had he thought it was a good idea to put something so horrifyingly embarrassing on the Internet, where anyone – including, it turns out, Victor himself – could stumble across it?

He was going to become a shrine priest. In the most remote temple that he could find. The kind that tourists never, ever stumbled across, just in case.

Screen!Victor pressed his fingertip to his lips in that thoughtful, maddeningly suggestive way. His blue eyes looked off to one side, as if trying to compose a polite response to the deranged weirdness evident in Yuuri’s tweet.

“That’s… that’s so sweet!” Victor said at last, his mouth bending into a heart-shaped smile that was the rarest and most amazing of all the Victor smiles (Yuuri had a list, of course). “Dokidokiniki must be a real skating fan to notice details like GOE. Although I don’t want to be responsible for anyone’s internal organs exploding. Please take care of yourself, dokidokiniki!”

Forget the word ‘dick’. This was the quote that Yuuri need to set as his notification tone for the rest of his life.

Just as Yuuri expected would happen if they ever did meet in person, Victor moved on from him just a heartbeat later.

“ _I like to pretend that Prince’s Darling Nikki was written about Victor Nikiforov, mostly because it gives me hope that I might someday walk in on him masturbating to a magazine too_.” Screen!Victor pauses, then beams. “Amazing! I’ve always loved Prince, but this tweet has given me a new appreciation for his work.”

The last few words are spoken in a purr, turning Yuuri’s spine to liquid butter. This video might be more dangerous than Victor’s last cologne commercial, and that one had almost given him a sprained wrist.

“Just two more left,” Victor says with a sly pout. “I guess I don’t make you that thirsty after all, Internet.”

There’s a muffled voice from off-screen, somewhere behind the camera, and Victor’s face lights up again. “Oh! I’ve been assured that there were about a million thirst tweets, and since I only have half an hour to record this video, the Buzzfeed staff paired it down to their favorites. How sweet of them! And how lucky for the tweeters who were chosen. I’ll be looking you all up later!”

Yuuri pauses the video. Breathes deeply. Then opens the Twitter app and deletes his dokidokiniki account. Phichit assured him it was totally anonymous, but he’s not about to take any chances. Yuuri’s skating makes him look unprofessional enough; the last thing he needs is for everyone to discover that he’s not a pro at all, just some fool who’d taken his childhood crush to ridiculous extremes.

“ _I need to invent time travel so I can stuff my face on a young Victor + old Victor Nikiforov sandwich_.” Screen!Victor seems less pleased about this one. Even on the tiny screen of his phone, Yuuri can see the ice wash over his blue eyes. “I was barely of legal age when I cut off my long hair, you know, so this one seems hardly plausible, even without the time travel. I’m also not a fan of sleeping with people who think that I’m old! Looks like you’ll just have to find some other way to slake your thirst, rawmevictor69.”

Screen!Victor crumples up the paper and tosses it over his shoulder dismissively. “Last one!”

He pulls out the final tweet and scans it for a moment. “This is from a verified account!” he exclaims gleefully. “Where do I know that name? Wait, no… yes! That’s it! The Thai skater, the one who took silver at Junior Worlds last year!”

Screen!Victor begins enthusing about Phichit’s presentation score and musicality which are, yes, fantastic. Yuuri can’t hear a thing he’s saying, though.

Phichit has confessed on more than one occasion that he doesn’t find Victor all that attractive. He’s supportive, as any best friend would be, but he doesn’t feel even a single drop of Yuuri’s yearning for Nikiforov. Which means, if Phichit has thirst-tweeted something about Victor…

“ _True thirst is spending ten years becoming an internationally ranked male singles skater just so you can ogle Victor Nikiforov’s butt in person_.”

Yuuri is going to die. Yuuri is already dead, probably, and this moment is just the brief pause before the long white tunnel kicks in. Maybe a lot of people have died in this specific second and the service is overloaded, like Twitter gets whenever something really exciting happens. Yuuri is experiencing the Fail Whale of Death.

Screen!Victor looks at the camera and unleashes a smile made of puppies and rainbows. “Phichit! Did you really?” He looks down at the paper and then back up, his smile turned soft and bashful. There’s a vulnerability to his eyes that Yuuri’s never seen before, not in all the hundred of interviews he’s watched. “I… this is the most amazing thing I’ve ever heard of. I always hope that my skating encourages other people to take to the ice themselves, but the idea that someone could be inspired in this level…”

He looks off into the distance for a moment before composing himself and looking straight into the camera with a polished grin.

“I’ll be looking for you at my next competition, Phichit Chulanont. And you can ogle my butt all you want.”

Screen!Victor winks. The video ends.

Yuuri is somehow not dead.

Victor Nikiforov now knows that one of his competitors on the international stage is only there because of their thirst for Victor himself.

He mistakenly believes this skater to be Phichit Chulanont.

Things would probably be easier and less confusing if Yuuri were dead.

 

* * *

 

“OMG!” says Phichit when Yuuri tells him about the video. Like the digital native he is, Phichit uses the letters of the acronym, not the actual words. “So Victor knows about you?!?”

“Not exactly. He thought you were tweeting about yourself.”

“Huh.” Phichit chews thoughtfully on his nutritionist-approved baked chicken, then licks his chopsticks to capture the last of his non-approved sweet chili dipping sauce. “Still, this gives us an in, Yuuri! Victor said he was going to look for me at competitions, right? We’re both at Skate America which is _literally_ next weekend, and which _you_ are also attending in order to cheer me on!”

Yuuri frowns at the smattering of steamed vegetables left on his plate. He would kill a man for something deep-fried and the season has barely started yet. “Celestino wants me to stay here and focus on my quad sal.”

“Pfft!” say his roommate, waving off their coach’s concerns with a flick of his wrist. “I say you’re coming, so you are. That means our plan is simple! I meet Nikiforov during warm-ups, correct his mistake and get you two hooked up before the closing banquet!”

“What? No!” Yuuri squeaks. “You are absolutely forbidden from telling Victor that I had anything to do with that tweet.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s embarrassing!” Yuuri cannot believe he has to explain such a basic concept as _personal dignity_ to Phichit.

Then again, they’ve been roommates for eighteen months now. Yuuri is well aware that Phichit places dignity on a lower value scale than “hilarious memes” and “viral-worthy content”.

Phichit groans, clearing away their dishes and hiding his forbidden chili sauce under the loose tile in the kitchen floor. Celestino isn’t the type to closely monitor their diets – he prefers to trust his skaters, a statement that always fills Yuuri with intense guilt and vivid memories of his most recent diet-breaking binge – but Phichit has seen too many spy films to not use a secret hiding place once he realized that one existed in their shitty student apartment.

“Well, it’s not like I can claim that tweet was actually about me! What if he tries to hit on me?”

Yuuri groans, burying his face in his hands. “Victor Nikiforov is not going to hit on you. Or me, for that matter. He is going to realize what a creepy fanboy I am and avoid us both forever. If not longer.”

“Hey, hey,” says Phichit in his calming voice, the one that lets Yuuri know that he sounds like he’s on the edge of a panic attack. “Listen. I’m sure Victor has forgotten about the whole thing already. I mean, according to his Instagram, he was doing a full day of press in New York before heading to Milwaukee to prep for Skate America, right? There is no way he’s going to remember one little tweet out of the hours and hours of interviews he just did!”

Yuuri breathes deeply and lets his best friend’s rare foray into common sense wash over him. Sure, Victor _said_ he was going to look up all the tweeters later, but what were the odds he’d actually _do_ that? Especially in the midst of a whirlwind media schedule and preparing to earn a record-breaking fifth consecutive GPF title?

“You’re right, Peach.” Yuuri sighs, running his hands through his hair. “Just, promise me that if he ever does ask, you’ll take my secret to the grave.”

“What else are besties for?”

Between washing up after dinner, 40 pages of reading for a class that Yuuri regrets taking, and an hour of mutually agonizing stretches with Phichit, he’s almost able to put the whole mess out of his mind.

At least, until Phichit does his usual pre-bed social media check and screams.

“What is it?”

His best friend flips his phone towards Yuuri, the screen glowing bright in their otherwise darkened room.

“Victor Nikiforov just sent me an Instagram DM.”

 

* * *

 

_Hi Phichit! I see we’re both at Skate America next week, looking forward to meeting you! I hope my butt does not disappoint in person_ ಠ‿↼


	2. The Best Butt in Men's Figure Skating

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yuuri accompanies Phichit to Skate America to make sure things don't get out hand, and then promptly makes everything worse. If rolling around on the floor in a darkened hotel room with Victor Nikiforov can really be considered "worse"...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings: reference to a panic attack which happens off-page. References to anxiety.
> 
> Un-beta'ed, so please let me know if you spot any mistakes!

Skate America is in Milwaukee, a five-hour drive from Detroit, so Yuuri is there too, rinkside with an assistant coach badge and a burning determination to keep Phichit away from Victor Nikiforov at all costs. He was supposed to stay home this weekend and work on his quad salchow, but Phichit has been quoting _Clueless_ all week so there is no way he can be trusted alone in the same city as Victor.

When Yuuri falls on his face at Skate Canada, which he will, it’s going to be Phichit’s fault. He’s told Phichit this six times already. His roommate cackles every single time.

“How’d that look?” Phichit asks, sliding up the barrier after a run-through of his final spin sequence. Luckily for Yuuri, there are four practice blocks for the men’s single skaters on the day before the competition officially starts, and Victor isn’t on the ice until the next one. “It felt like I was travelling a bit on the position changes.”

“You were,” replies their coach, flipping around his phone to show Phichit the footage and pointing out in detail what changes he needs to make.

“Got it!” says Phichit with a firm nod, gliding back onto the ice and launching into his spin again. It’s better this time. He’s starting a run-though of his step sequence when a voice over the loudspeaker announces the end of his practice and brings him gliding back to where Celestino and Yuuri are waiting. “Hi Victor!”

Yuuri really hopes he didn’t hear that correctly. As Phichit pulls on his skate guards, Yuuri turns and yep, sure enough, Victor Effing Nikiforov is standing _right next to him_.

Miraculously, a sinkhole does not open up and swallow Yuuri whole.

In this moment, he hates miracles.

Victor is astonishingly beautiful in person, his skin flawless and his silver hair gleaming under the bright lights of the rink. There’s a sparkle to his eyes that the cameras don’t pick up, or at least they haven’t in a long time. He looks almost like his younger self, Yuuri thinks, despite the short hair and broader shoulders (so broad, he muses, his eyes tracing along muscles exposed by the tight fit of his practice shirt and _no Yuuri stop that right now!_ ).

Feeling the heat of a bright blush on his cheeks, Yuuri spins his head back around to shoot Phichit a warning glare. They’d discussed, in detail, what was and was NOT okay for Phichit to say if Victor brought up the tweet. Any violations of their sacred roommate pact will put both Phichit’s illegal hamsters and his forbidden chili sauce at risk.

Yuuri can only pray that those threats are enough.

“Hi Phichit! It’s nice to finally meet you,” Victor says, stepping forward to shake hands. It’s almost comical how much he towers over the petite Thai skater. Then again, Yuuri’s in sneakers rather than the tall skates both Victor and Phichit are wearing, so he’s actually the shortest among them at the moment. “Coach Celestino, you’ve done a great job getting him prepped for this season. I saw his programs from last year and the improvement in his triple axel is amazing!”

Triple axel? That was near the middle of practice, wasn’t it? Oh shit, just how long has Victor been standing next to Yuuri? Why is he so bad at this? Is there some kind of job where being hopelessly unobservant is a useful skill? Yuuri should find out and then do that, because if this conversation goes the way he fears it will, his career as a professional figure skater is over.

Celestino and Phichit both beam at the praise. “That’s all Phichit. He’s been working very hard this year.”

“Well, it’s easy to keep focused when you have the right motivation,” Victor says with a wink.

It takes Yuuri a moment to parse the meaning of Victor’s remark, but Phichit gets it right away. “Ah, about that tweet. That, uh, that wasn’t about me.”

“No?” Victor says, his smile faltering just the smallest amount. “Oh. Of course. It was just a joke, I suppose. I mean, it was a ridiculous premise.”

This is it. Yuuri’s salvation. All Phichit has to do is pretend the tweet was a joke and Victor need never discover what an unprofessional, stalker weirdo he really is. They can all laugh about it and then Victor can go practice and Yuuri can remember how breathing works again.

Except… except there was a brightness in Victor’s expression that doesn’t quite seem to be there any more. His smile is as perfect as ever, but his eyes look tired, or maybe a little sad. Something in Yuuri’s chest aches at the change.

“Yeah…” Phichit starts to say, just as Yuuri blurts out, “No, it’s real. It’s just not Phichit.”

“Wow, amazing!” Victor grins and, oh no, he’s training the blinding spotlight of his smile on Yuuri of all people. Yuuri can’t _breathe_. “You have to tell me who!”

“Victor, this is Yuuri Katsuki,” Celestino pipes up, since Yuuri is far too stunned to speak and Phichit is too busy trying to take stealth photos of Yuuri’s undoubtedly ridiculous expression to be polite. “Another of my other men’s singles skaters.”

“It's nice to finally meet the most tragically underscored skater on the senior circuit,” replies Victor, holding out his hand. “I was so disappointed to see that we weren’t in any of the same GPF qualifiers again this year.”

“Uh, yeah, I, uh, me too,” Yuuri mutters, staring at Victor’s outstretched hand for way longer than is polite before reaching out his own.

Victor’s hands are a little rough, calloused on his palms from weight training, but his skin is warm and his fingers are long and elegant. Yuuri has a flash of wondering how different those fingers would feel from his own shorter digits, which is enough to make him blush, yelp, and pull his hand away quickly, as if physical contact might somehow give Victor access to Yuuri’s depraved mental landscape.

"At least that gives us both motivation to get to the Finals!" Victor says brightly, blessedly ignorant of the terrible things Yuuri keeps imaging.

“Victoooor!” yells a harsh Russian voice from across the rink. “Get on the ice! Now!”

Victor waves at his coach, still beaming. “Yes, Yakov!” he shouts, before turning back to Yuuri and Phichit. “Please, you have to tell me who it is. Please.”

Phichit grins, like having a Living Legend begging him for secret information has made his month. Which, to be fair, it probably has. “Can’t, sorry. I made a promise.”

“Yuuuuuuuri,” Victor whines, drawing out his name in a way that makes all the hairs on Yuuri’s neck stand at attention.

It should be illegal for one human being to be this sexy. Shouldn’t there be a quota or something? There must be a dozen people who are short on their fair share of sexiness because Victor Nikiforov is hoarding it all. Maybe that’s where Yuuri’s own desirability went, pulled through a TV screen when he was twelve.

It’s probably for the best. Yuuri would have no idea what to do with sexiness anyway. Victor is clearly putting it to better use than Yuuri ever would have.

“You didn’t make a promise, did you?”

Yuuri shakes his head, unwilling to speak. He’s pretty sure that squawking noises are all he could manage.

“Then tell me? Please?” Victor leans in closer, so close that Yuuri can smell the hint of musk on his skin, the strawberry sweetness of his shampoo.  “I’ll let you ogle the best butt in men’s figure skating if you do.”

“All I need for that is a mirror,” is what he blurts out, and holy hell, where did _that_ come from? He clamps both hands over his mouth as Victor leans back and Phichit breaks out in laughter.

“He’s not wrong,” his best friend says, adding – as ever – fuel to the dumpster fire that is Yuuri’s life.

“Victoooor!” shouts Yakov again, the entire rink practically vibrating with his anger.

Yuuri cringes but Victor seems completely unphased. He shouts back, “coming, Yakov!” before placing a hand on Yuuri’s shoulder and spinning him around.

“Hmmm…” he mutters, and oh god, Yuuri is dead, where is a sinkhole when you need one, Victor Effing Nikiforov has a hand on his shoulder and is _staring_ at his butt. No, not just staring. Appraising. Studying. Openly and shamelessly _ogling_. Yuuri hasn’t felt this uncomfortable in his own body since the last time he hung out with Christophe Giacometti. “You may be right, but I think we need more time to compare. Grab dinner with me tonight?”

Yuuri says nothing, because Yuuri can’t open his mouth. Yuuri can’t speak, because that requires your lungs to be filled with air first, and Yuuri has not managed to breathe since Victor’s hand touched his shoulder. Victor just asked Yuuri to dinner and it’s not going to happen because Yuuri is accidentally asphyxiating himself at the very thought.

"We usually do room service and a movie before the short,” says Phichit, gathering up the acres of awkward silence that Yuuri has spilled everywhere. “Pre-competition ritual, you know? But you’re welcome to join us.”

“Perfect!” Victor says, slipping off his skate guards and finally, finally sliding onto the ice for his own practice session. At least, that’s what Yuuri assumes is happening from the noises behind him. He still hasn’t recovered enough to actually turn around. Or breathe. Or blink. Or form even incoherent thoughts beyond the running chorus of _what the fuck what the fuck what the fuck_ that has become his new personal mantra. “I’ll message you on instagram for details after Yakov is done yelling at me. Bye!”

“So, which of you is going to explain to me what that was all about?” Celestino asks.

“Later, coach!” replies Phichit as he drags Yuuri towards the change rooms. “First I need to get this boy into his skinny jeans!”

* * *

The movie is The Skater and the King, of course. Phichit’s invited Leo de la Iglesia along, so he’s not – as he put it – “completely third-wheeling your date,” which is such a ridiculous notion that Yuuri can’t even bring himself to laugh. Victor wants to know who Phichit’s tweet was about. He thinks Yuuri can tell him. That’s all. He's probably not even going to show up.

Victor also thinks Yuuri is tragically underscored which, well. Yuuri needs to lie down every time he thinks about that. Sure, some fan forums have made that argument, but for _Victor Nikiforov_ to say it? Out loud? Where Yuuri could hear him?

If he keeps thinking about it, he’s definitely going to have another panic attack. The one this afternoon was bad enough, twenty minutes locked in their hotel room bathroom gasping raggedly into the knees of his track pants while Phichit and Celestino were off having their post-practice strategy session. That one was inspired by the memory of his quip about the best butt in figure skating, which he still didn’t understand. Yes, Victor had been too close and too sexy and generally too everything, and yes, Yuuri had been desperate to put some space between them before his nerves fell completely off a cliff, but why on earth had his brain come up with _that_ as a solution?

Anyway. He’s still a bit woozy from his earlier bout of weakness, feeling a bit stretched thin, and he can’t risk a second incident, so he’s doing his best to just not think about it.

Which has never in the history of the universe actually worked for him, but whatever.

“It’s too bad Guong Hong isn’t here,” says Leo as he settles in beside Phichit on the tiny couch. “At least you’ll get to hang out with him next weekend, Yuuri!”

“Sure,” he replies, although that seems unlikely. Guang Hong has never actually spoken to Yuuri unless Phichit is around. It’s a bit awkward, how Phichit in his first year on the senior circuit already has more friends than Yuuri has made in his four years around the same people, but then Phichit is charming and outgoing and Yuuri is a neurotic mess, so he supposes it’s less ‘awkward’ than ‘inevitable’. “You guys are both at Rostelecom this year, right?”

Leo grins, excited, but before he can launch into whatever plans they’ve made for sightseeing around the competition events, there’s a knock at the door. Yuuri darts a frantic glance at Phichit.

“I have staked my couch claim, Yuuri. You get the door.”

“I didn’t think he’d actually come,” Yuuri hisses.

His palms are starting to sweat. Is that even a thing, he wonders, as he crosses what feels like the vast gulf of their fairly small hotel room. It is now. Maybe if his palms sweat too much, he won’t be able to work the doorknob and Victor will go away and he’ll be able to avoid the crushing disaster that this evening promises to be.

There’s another knock, this one a little softer than before, as if the person knocking isn’t sure if they’re actually welcome. Yuuri takes a single, steadying breath and opens the door.

Victor stands in the hallway, radiant and flawless as always. He’s wearing a soft black t-shirt and pale grey track pants that hang low on his hips, his feet bundled in fuzzy black socks. Dangling from one arm is a plastic bag, which he hoists proudly into the air. As Yuuri moves aside, he steps into the room and proclaims, “I brought snacks! That's what you're supposed to do, right?”

“Where’s your coat?” Yuuri asks, dumbly, because even though Victor is Russian, it is a fall night in Milwaukee which means it’s definitely not t-shirt weather.

“Oh, I’m staying at this hotel too,” he replies, unloading two bags of plain popcorn and a variety of flavored waters onto the desk.

“I thought you were at the Pfister?” Yuuri asks. This Holiday Inn is more than fine by their student housing standards but Victor’s the type to fly first class and stay in five-star hotels. The sheets here aren’t even Egyptian cotton. Victor’s skin looks refined enough to be damaged by too low a thread count. “You posted a photo of their lobby yesterday."

Great, Victor is definitely going to think he’s a stalker now that he’s revealed his encyclopedic knowledge of his Instagram contents. Not that Victor even seems to notice his slip-up, barreling on as if it was totally normal to have thoughts about a complete stranger’s travel itinerary.

“I always do that,” he says with a grin. “That way my fans and the paparazzi stake out the wrong hotel and I don’t have to deal with them unless I’m in the mood for it. The hotels never mind, they like the publicity.”

Huh. That’s… actually pretty clever. And not something Yuuri thought that Victor would need to do. He always seems so comfortable dealing with the press – unlike Yuuri, who never makes it through a media gauntlet without stuffing both feet in his mouth at least once.

As Yuuri slots this new information into his mental map of Victor, the man himself strides across the room and offers his hand to Leo. “Hello, I’m Victor!”

Leo looks a little awestruck to be meeting Victor – Yuuri’s not sure if Phichit warned him – but recovers quickly enough. “Leo.”

“That’s right, the American who always has such good music!” Victor says. “Is it okay if I sit on the floor while we watch the movie? I need to finish my evening stretches.”

Without waiting for an answer, Victor flops down on the carpet like some kind of sexy ragdoll and folds himself in half. This close, the reminder of his impressive flexibility short-circuits the rational part of Yuuri’s brain, so when Phichit suggests that Yuuri also needs to do some stretching, he doesn’t protest, just sits on the floor too. He’s grateful that he’d firmly rejected Phichit’s efforts to squeeze him into skinny jeans, because those things were not meant for splits.

“Yay! I always find it easier with a partner,” replies Victor.

This is how Katsuki Yuuri spends the night before Skate America watching The King and the Skater for the eighty-sixth time while Victor Nikiforov pushes him into stretches and then demands that Yuuri return the favor. Victor’s skin is warm through his soft clothes and Yuuri can feel the strength of his muscles, straining and then relaxing as each pose deepens under Yuuri’s gentle pressure. He smells clean, like he’d showered just before coming over, and there’s a patch of hair at the nape of his neck that’s still damp. When it’s Yuuri’s turn to stretch, Victor’s hands are firm and broad, touching just as much as needed to help ease him into each position. Yuuri’s spent over an hour touching and being touched by Victor Nikiforov in a darkened hotel room and if it’s not quite the way his fantasies about this scenario usually go, it’s _real_ and that makes it better than anything his imagination could concoct.

Also less believable, frankly. Thank goodness Phichit is taking stealth pictures or Yuuri would dismiss the whole thing tomorrow morning as some elaborate and startlingly tactile fever dream.

Yuuri doesn’t need to pay much attention to the film, so he’s able to focus just on Victor. It’s so strange to him, the soft smile that Victor’s wearing, the faint hint of delight radiating off him as they stretch on the floor and challenge each other to catch the popcorn that Phichit and Leo keep lobbing in their direction. Yuuri had always assumed that Victor spent his off time at competitions doing something glamorous, dining at upscale restaurants or clubbing perhaps, if he wasn’t entertaining some other beautiful person in the privacy of his expensive hotel suite. The other option that seemed plausible was Victor being laser-focused on his upcoming skates, immune to the pressure that the rest of them feel.

Instead, he’s… this. Staying at a cheap hotel to avoid the press, blowing off steam with a stupid film and the company of a few other skaters. Comfortable and a little quiet. Humming along to the movie’s familiar songs, laughing and clapping when Phichit breaks out his Thai dance moves to the closing number.

Even so, Yuuri feels compelled to apologize when they’re saying good-night. Phichit and Leo have fallen down a YouTube hole of cute animal videos and merely wave goodbye from where they’re huddled over Phichit’s phone, so Yuuri’s left to walk Victor to the door alone. He’s pretty sure that was intentional on Phichit’s part.

“I’m sorry this wasn’t very exciting.”

“Don’t be! I… I really liked it,” Victor says, his smile soft. “It’s a nice change from what I usually do at these events.”

Victor is so nice, it’s killing Yuuri. He has something good to say to everyone he meets and now he’s even making excuses so Yuuri doesn’t feel bad about how boring and dumb he is.

“You don’t have to say that…”

“I’m not just saying it!” Victor cuts him off. “Do you know what I would be doing right now if you and Phichit hadn’t invited me over? Watching Food TV alone in my room and fantasizing about everything I’m going to eat once I retire. I have a list, you know.”

That… doesn’t make any sense. Victor is amazing. He’s gorgeous and funny and famous and an actual champion. People must be lining up around the block to spend time with him. And yet he sounds... bitter? It’s startling to Yuuri. In all the interviews he’s watched of Victor – in all the interviews there _are_ of Victor, since that’s basically the same thing – Yuuri has never once heard this sour note in his voice.

Victor seems to realize that fact in the same moment Yuuri does, because his cheeks go faintly pink and he shakes his hair down over his forehead, hiding his eyes. “Ah! Don’t mind me, I must be more tired than I realized. See you tomorrow?”

Yuuri nods. How is this his life? “Yeah, tomorrow. Good luck with your short program.”

Victor waves and the door closes between them with a soft click. Yuuri leans his head against it, pressing his forehead to the painted wood. He needs the physical sensation to ground him, to give his whirling thoughts somewhere to land. He met Victor. He met Victor and it went well. Better than well, maybe. Victor had an okay time. With him. Yuuri. Victor and Yuuri had a nice evening together and it’s over and Yuuri is still here, still breathing and feeling a warm, buzzy glow wash over him.

It’s not until later, after Leo’s gone back to his room and Phichit is quietly snoring, as Yuuri is desperately trying to do the same in anticipation of his early morning rink time, that a curious realization strikes him.

Victor never asked about the tweet. Not once.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was supposed to be cute and funny but it turns out I have a lot of feelings about Sad-Pre-Yuuri!Victor that will not be repressed? 
> 
> I'm hoping to wrap this up in five chapters, posting every three weeks (I have some work travel coming up, so I may not be able to stick to that schedule 100%, but I will do my best!).
> 
> Thanks for reading, and if you'd like to leave a comment but don't know what to say, just have a drink of water and tell me about it! (idea shamelessly stolen from [lazulisong](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lazulisong/pseuds/lazulisong), whose writing you should definitely check out.)


	3. Of Press Dating and Quad Salchows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victor is nice. It's a bit much for Yuuri.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning: anxiety, description of an anxiety attack.
> 
> If you'd like to skip reading the attack itself (the anxiety is kind of embedded through the whole work, sorry!), you can stop at "As much as he’s dreamed of Victor saying nice things about him" and skip down to "When he looks up, Victor is still there".

Yuuri is not a morning person, but his quad salchow is pathetic so he drags himself out of bed and to the rink at four a.m. anyway. This heinously early time slot was the only one Celestino could secure for him at the official event rink, although he’s managed to book another few hours in the afternoon at MSOE Kern Center, just a kilometer away. That time won’t be fully private – knowing Yuuri’s luck, there will be hockey players hanging around, ugh – so this morning’s practice is really the only chance he has to nail down this jump if he doesn’t want to humiliate himself by eating ice in front of strangers.

Celestino’s not there, so Yuuri straps on his skates and gets warmed up. This is Phichit’s weekend, after all, and their coach already warned Yuuri that he might need to sleep in so that he’s prepared to handle his competing student’s evening skate slot. Once Yuuri’s feeling limber and at least partially awake, he sets up his phone to take footage and starts practice in earnest, running through the salchow with the entry from his free skate. It’s trickier than his short program set-up, and something about the footwork leading into the jump always causes Yuuri to mess up his edges on the landing. He’s not falling, at least most of the time, but it’s not exactly elegant.

He makes it through five attempts before the inevitable crash on the ice. Wincing, he springs back to his feet and rubs where his new bruise is being born, right on top of his old bruise. Lovely.

“Yuuri!” shouts a familiar voice from across the empty rink. “Are you okay?”

What on earth is Victor Effing Nikiforov doing here, now? His practice time is later this afternoon and his short program isn’t until 8 pm. He should still be asleep, not gliding across the ice towards Yuuri with a steaming take-out cup in his hand and his hair falling perfectly over one bright eye.

“I’m fine,” Yuuri mumbles, not nearly awake enough to deal with the overwhelming everything that is Victor. His shirt is really tight and for a second Yuuri wonders if that’s dangerous, like maybe it could impede blood flow during practice, which – because he’s tired, and a pervert – makes him think about other ways that blood flow could be impeded and for _fuck’s sake, Yuuri’s brain_ , _it is 4:30 a.m. which is far too early to think about cock rings_. “I’ve taken that fall a dozen times this week.”

“I can tell,” said Victor skating in a graceful circle around Yuuri. “You know, you may be right. Maybe I don’t have the best ass in figure skating anymore.”

What. Just. What. Yuuri’s brain can’t handle that remark, so he pretends he didn’t hear it. Ignoring reality is a viable survival strategy, right? It’s going to have to be, at least if reality insists on being so utterly bizarre.

“What are you doing here, Victor?”

“I couldn’t sleep, and I saw on Phichit’s twitter that you had early ice time, so I thought I’d come down and see if you were willing to share. Green tea? Sorry, it’s the closest I could find to genmaicha at this hour.”

He holds out the cup to Yuuri, who accepts it on auto-pilot. The taste is a little bitter, like hotel tea often is, but the warmth and caffeine are nice. He tries not to think about how Victor knows what Yuuri likes to drink in the morning.

“Thanks,” he mumbles, skating towards the rink edge. Years of training under Minako at Ice Castle have ingrained in him certain protocols, the chief of which is to never bring anything onto the ice that you don’t need for a performance, and certainly not anything that could spill. “Why couldn’t you sleep? Don’t tell me you get nervous like the rest of us mortals.”

Victor tilts his head, the tiniest frown of confusion between his perfect eyebrows. “Mortals?”

It’s strange to realize that Yuuri’s English might be better than Victor’s, but he has been living in America for a few years now. “Uh, regular people. Not gods.”

“Ah, like смертные! No, it’s not nerves, just insomnia. I get the kind where you can’t stay asleep, instead of the kind where you can’t get to sleep.” Victor shrugs. “At least it’s useful for getting to practice on time.”

“No wonder you left early last night,” says Yuuri, taking a deep sip from his cup before heading back towards center ice.

“Sorry to be so boring,” Victor replies. “I usually wake up around four, so if I don’t go to bed by 10, I’m a wreck the next day.”

Yuuri has… so many questions about this. About everything Victor-related, really. But he also has an abysmal quad salchow and one week to beat it into competition shape, so he pushes them aside to focus on practice. “You can use the left side of the rink, if you want. I think we get company at five.”

“Thanks!” Victor says brightly, spinning around and skating to the far side of the rink.

Yuuri really should be practicing his jumps, but he’s unnerved by the awareness of Victor’s proximity. It’s an Olympic-sized rink but with Victor there it feels far too small, like Yuuri’s every awkward gesture is being broadcast in close-up on the jumbotron overhead. Victor’s not doing anything exciting, just simple warm-ups and twizzles. He’s probably saving his energy for tonight’s performance. Yuuri has no such excuse.

He manages to not wipe out on his next salchow, but it’s not exactly graceful either. Risking a glance across the ice, he’s relieved to see that Victor isn’t watching him, focused instead on his own movements. That’s good. Yuuri can work with that, as much as he wants to just stand there and gawp at Victor. He’s never gotten to see the other man skate from this close, after all, and the lizard part of his cerebral cortex wants nothing more than to roll around in the moment forever. Fortunately, the non-lizard part is mostly in the driver’s seat today. Mostly. Victor’s butt is _right there_ , fully on display in his sinfully tight practice pants, and it really is the best one in figure skating.

Two more salchows – both unbalanced but landed – follow, before he wipes out on the third. He springs up as quickly as he can manage, only to see Victor standing with his hands on his hips, watching Yuuri carefully.

This is it. The end of their – acquaintance? friendship? – whatever the strange, tenuous thing building between them could have been called. Victor has realized that Yuuri is a terrible skater, and probably a terrible person too. He’s going to leave. He’s going to take back the green tea when he does.

“Your shoulders are tilting a little to the right as you enter the jump, I think that’s what throws off your edges on the landing. Try doing the jump as a Tano variation with your right arm raised, that might correct your balance.”

That’s ridiculous. Tano jumps are harder than regular ones, and if Yuuri is botching the quad sal as a normal jump there’s no way he can manage it as a Tano version. But still, this advice is from Victor Nikiforov, skating god, so he might as well take it.

Yuuri tries the jump again. Throws his right arm up as he spins through the air. Lands….

Perfectly?

From across the rink, Victor applauds, skating across the center line and towards Yuuri. “Amazing! That was beautiful. How did it feel?”

Yuuri shakes his head, trying to clear away his confusion. He made his jump harder and so he landed it better? That’s not how this is supposed to work.

“Good?” he says, still uncertain. “I’ll need to see how it works with the full program, though.”

“So show me,” says Victor, skating to the exit.

Yuuri freezes. He doesn’t have music or a costume or anything. It’s just before five a.m. and Victor Effing Nikiforov expects a command performance from him?

His terror must be written loud across his face because Victor takes pity on him. Sort of. “Your program music is on your phone, yes?”

Yuuri nods. “In the skate music folder. Uh, the passcode is 2208.”

He can practically feel the ice dissolving under his skates as he remembers that his phone’s passcode is Victor’s latest free skate world record score, minus the decimal place. Victor doesn’t seem to notice, poking at his phone until a familiar melody rings out across the rink.

“Wait, let me get into starting position.”

Victor waits until Yuuri circles around a few times, shaking out his shoulders, before assuming his starting pose at center ice. “Ready?”

Yuuri nods. A moment later, the music starts.

He does his best to lose himself in the choreography, in the gentle tug between the music and the skate. Being horrifically tired helps, as if his anxiety is still mostly tucked under the blankets back in his hotel room. His performance is fairly clean, aside from a less than perfect shift into the second-half step sequence, but he’s bracing himself for the final jump, that damned quad salchow he can barely manage on its own, let alone as the climax of an exhausting skate. Still, he throws his arm up in the Tano variation that Victor has suggested and it goes better than he would ever have believed, smooth and stable as he sweeps into his final spin.

When he relaxes out of his final pose, Victor is bouncing at the side of the rink, clapping his hands and shouting wordless noises of encouragement. Yuuri is brought back to reality with a jolt.

“Wow, that was amazing! I can’t believe I got to see your new free skate before the rest of the world!” gushes Victor, skating out to join him at center ice. “It’s much more technically challenging than last year’s program! You’ll definitely make the final with this.”

Phichit has said the same thing to Yuuri countless times, but it is somehow harder to ignore coming from Victor. Yuuri has been primed since his youth to accept Victor’s word as gospel.

“Uh, thanks? I mean, I usually do better in practice than in competition, but maybe?”

Victor stares at him for a long moment, one fingertip pressed to his lips. Yuuri tries not to imagine him sucking on it. He fails.

“I know you’re frequently underscored but you mustn’t let that undermine your confidence. You’re a brilliant skater and with a program like this, there’s no way for the judges to deny it!”

Yuuri sticks with the mental image of Victor sliding his fingertip seductively between his lips, because it’s safer than trying to make his brain process any of the words that have just been spoken by said lips.

“Did you, uh, want the ice? For your own run-through?” he babbles, desperate to change the trajectory of this conversation.

As much as he’s dreamed of Victor saying nice things about him, about his skating, in practice it’s overwhelming. His fists clench at his sides; his skin feels clammy, and not just from the sweat that’s starting to cool beneath his practice shirt. Then he realizes that, holy shit, he just asked Victor to skate his super-secret new program just for him, and that’s it. He breaks. Gliding to the exit, he slips on his skate guards, hanging onto the rail for stability. Not just physical stability. He can feel his lungs wanting to seize up, his breath growing shallower with every inhale. No. Just no. He does not want to do this now, here, in front of Victor of all people. Of course, the fact that it’s the last thing he wants makes it the most likely thing to happen, now that he’s started to tip over that cliff.

Maybe he’ll get lucky. Maybe Victor is already on the ice and Yuuri will have a few private moments to pull himself back together.

“Hey, are you alright?” Victor asks.

Yuuri’s luck is shit.

He stumbles over to the nearest bench and flops down, pressing his face in between his knees. It’s better like this, dark and a bit muffled. He pushes out the thoughts of Victor, of skating, of everything, and tries to follow his breathing like Celestino taught him. In, out. In, out. It doesn’t really help. _Confidence_ and _brilliant_ ring through his head in Victor’s sultry accent. He’s neither of those things. He will never be either of those things. He’s met Victor and Victor seems to like him but really, it’s not Yuuri that Victor likes. It’s an idea of Yuuri that’s nothing like the real thing, the boring and ordinary person that Yuuri truly is. Victor is going to figure that out. Is figuring it out right now as Yuuri has a complete humiliating breakdown in front of him for no apparent reason. What kind of idiot gets upset because their idol said something _nice_ about them? Yuuri is the absolute worst.

Eventually he gets it together, because even he can’t manage to wind himself into an infinite panic attack. Honestly, by his standards, this wasn’t too bad. He’d choked up but his knees aren’t covered in tears or snot, which means he didn’t openly cry. So there’s that.

When he looks up, Victor is still there. Which… Yuuri had really been hoping wouldn’t be the case. There are some other skaters on the ice – it must be after five – and Victor is positioned so that Yuuri is mostly hidden behind him. That’s good.

The expression on Victor’s face is one of unmitigated panic. That’s less good.

“Uh, sorry about,” Yuuri mumbles, waving in the general direction of his everything.

Victor is hovering, like he wants to touch Yuuri but isn’t sure if he should. His voice is small and a little lost as he says, “I didn’t know what to do.”

Yuuri shrugs. “That’s okay, there’s not much anyone can do. I just have to ride it out.”

“Like my insomnia,” Victor nods, as if he understands. “I can’t fix it, so I found ways to work around it. Although this seems harder to work around than insomnia.”

“It’s not great,” Yuuri admits, pushing to his feet. His failure to properly cool down is obvious when he moves, his muscles tight from the sudden cessation of activity. “Ow. I should probably stretch out for a bit. Sorry about…”

He shrugs again. Yuuri needs to apologize for everything about himself, so he doesn’t really know where to begin. There aren’t enough hours in the universe to catalog all of Yuuri’s failings, and he’s already taken up far too much of Victor’s time.

“No, I’m the one who should be apologizing!” Victor says, which makes no sense. “I should have known that it would upset you.”

“What, you saying nice things about me?”

“No! When I reminded you about how unfairly you’ve been treated in judging sometimes, especially since I’m the person who’s always being overscored!” Victor sounds deeply, genuinely apologetic and more than a little sad. It makes Yuuri’s chest ache to hear his voice like this. “What I said – it was rude and thoughtless of me. I’m sorry.”

That’s… ridiculous. Yuuri can’t stop himself from saying so out loud.

“What? No, Victor, that’s not it. First of all, you’re not overscored. You’re the greatest skater who has ever lived and you deserve every single point you’ve ever earned! And second, that’s not what made me, uh…”

He trails off again, because while Yuuri will always have the energy to defend Victor’s skating, even to Victor himself, he’s not as good at articulating what’s happening inside his own head.

“No?” Victor’s voice is still small, but there’s a hint of relief in it now, and damn it, Yuuri is going to have to explain if he wants Victor to stop blaming himself for Yuuri’s own weakness.

“I, uh, I have a hard time? With praise? Like there’s a disconnect between what I know about myself and what people are saying, and I can’t really make it fit?”

“So when I said your skating was brilliant?” Victor prompts, confusion lacing through the words.

“Hearing that? From you? It was a bit much.”

“Huh.”

Victor pauses, and Yuuri balls his hands into fists, feeling the tremble of his nerves rising up again. The praise was too much, and this conversation is too much, and Victor is never going to talk to him again – which, honestly, would be better than if Victor decided to make Yuuri his charity case and spend the rest of this weekend saying nice things to try and make him feel better, because people have done that before and it has a success rate of zero.

“Okay! Do you want to get breakfast? After we stretch, of course.”

This is not what Yuuri was expecting Victor to say, but he’s willing to go with it. Denial is a river Yuuri has long experience sailing down, and he’s perfectly content to bring a companion along for the ride.

 

* * *

 

They stretch and cool down properly before carting their gear back to the hotel. Victor’s room is on the top floor, and he invites Yuuri inside to wait as he drops off his skate bag. The room isn’t huge and the bed is _right there_ , the sheets still rumpled from where they were wound around Victor last night. Yuuri bites his lip, failing in his efforts to not imagine what Victor’s pale skin must have looked like against the white sheets with moonlight streaming in through the window, and focuses instead on what Victor is doing in the present, which is pulling one of a set of identical Tupperware containers out of his room’s minifridge.

“I can’t believe we survived our first fight!” Victor enthuses, cracking open the container and making a faintly disappointed face at the contents. “Oh, I guess we need to stop by your room to pick up your breakfast too.”

Neither of these remarks make much sense, but Yuuri tackles the most immediate one first. “I was just going to get whatever seemed healthiest at the hotel restaurant.”

“Really?” Victor asks, cocking his head as if the notion of ordering from a menu is foreign to him. Perhaps it is. He’s the type of famous that provides three adjectives to a celebrity chef and gets a custom-tailored meal twenty minutes later, after all. “Doesn’t that throw off your nutritionist’s plan?”

Yuuri shrugs. “So long as I get enough protein and vegetables, and steer clear of carbs and grease, Celestino doesn’t mind.”

“Wow! So lucky! I always find a case of these waiting for me at the hotel when I check in. My nutritionist works with local catering companies to make sure I stay on track even when I’m on the road.”

Victor holds out the container, which is a perfectly balanced set of boiled eggs, lightly steamed vegetables and what looks like soft tofu. The whole thing probably has the flavor content of a cardboard box. There isn’t even any salt.

“That’s….” Awful. Controlling. Just plain weird. Yuuri doesn’t think he can say any of those things out loud, so he settles for, “structured.”

“Well, that’s me,” replies Victor. The bitter note is back in his voice, just the tiniest little bit, but it’s enough to set Yuuri’s teeth on edge. “So we’re heading to the hotel restaurant, then?”

Yuuri nods. In the elevator, he thinks to ask, “What did you mean, our first fight?”

“Well, I said something that upset you, but then I apologized and you forgave me, which is a fight, right? And we’re still friends, so yay! First fight milestone achieved.”

Friends. Victor Effing Nikiforov thinks they are friends. After one movie night and an early-morning practice where Yuuri had a humiliating meltdown. His standards for friendship are remarkably low. Yuuri is not about to complain.

It’s six thirty by the time they reach the restaurant, which is still too early for most of the skating crowd, so they wind up seated among a smattering of business people who have no idea who either of them are. Victor gets a few lingering stares, which seem less inspired by his fame and more by his general beauty, which is in no way diminished by his plain t-shirt and slim track pants. Yuuri is, frankly, having a hard time not staring at his ass, which is why he insists on walking in front as they’re led to their table.

“If Yulia – that’s my publicist – found out I was seen in public like this, she’d have a meltdown,” Victor says, after Yuuri orders a poached egg and salad combination from their waiter.

“You look fine?” questions Yuuri.

Victor looks better than fine, if Yuuri is being honest. His silver hair is a bit spiky still from practice, and his skin is clear enough to reveal the faint dusting of freckles that run across his nose and are never, ever visible in photo shoots. There’s something softer than usual about his features, his lashes and eyebrows paler than they look in photos. His eyes are that brilliant blue, edging into azure, and they sparkle as they look across the table at Yuuri.

“Sure, but Victor Nikiforov,” and here, Victor’s voice does something ugly as he says his own name, “is not merely ‘fine’. He is… aspirational.”

Yuuri must still look confused, because Victor continues, “You were so smart to not play into your looks with your public persona. I mean, you could have – you’re gorgeous, after all – but you went for something with more depth. More substance. You let your skating speak for itself. I wish I’d been that smart.”

“I… don’t understand,” says Yuuri, because he honestly doesn’t know where this conversation is going. There’s not a single part of it he can process, from Victor saying that he’s gorgeous to the ugly, cracking tone of Victor’s voice as he talks about his image. Yuuri doesn’t _have_ an image. He has gif loops of falls and awkward interview quotes, memes that Phichit swears he didn’t make and publicity photos where he looks either constipated or confused. None of it adds up to anything _interesting_. “I’m just me.”

“Precisely!” Victor exclaims, as if that illuminates anything at all.  

Yuuri’s food arrives, which gives him something to do other than run that soundclip of _you’re gorgeous_ over and over in his head until it gathers enough speed to catch fire. He fumbles around for words to cut through the awkward silence that’s settled over their table, and blurts out, “So, uh, what’s your schedule for today?”

It’s a dumb question. Yuuri already knows Phichit’s schedule for the day. As a fellow competitor, Victor’s is basically the same. He winces, waiting for Victor to point out how awkward he’s being.

Victor doesn’t. Instead, he glances at his phone with a faint pout. “I’m meeting Yakov for our strategy session soon, then it’s press until my on-ice practice at 3. After that I usually nap until about an hour before I have to be on the ice.” At Yuuri’s questioning look, he shrugs. “I can’t stay asleep, but I can nap, usually, so that’s how I deal with evening competitions.”

“Wow. You really don’t get nervous like the rest of us, do you?” marvels Yuuri.

“Not about skating.” On anyone else, that might come across as arrogant, but surely four World Championships in a row come with the right to express a certain confidence in your abilities. “What about you, what does your schedule look like?”

“Keeping up my training, mostly. Um, this morning I’ll run and then hit the gym, and my coach booked me a few hours at a nearby rink this afternoon so I could get more ice time. This is Phichit’s first seniors event, so I’ll be rinkside to keep him company during the competition. After that, I don’t know? Whatever Phichit needs.”

“You two are close?” asks Victor. 

Yuuri nods. “We’re I didn’t really have any friends in Detroit until Phichit started training under Celestino two years ago. He really pushed me to open up more.”

“Oh? How open are you with each other?”

Victor places a long, sultry stress on the word _open_. Even so, it takes Yuuri a moment to pick up on the innuendo. Once he does, he flinches back, waving his hands frantically. “Not like that! I am so not his type.”

“Is he yours?”

Yuuri flushes. “I mean, he’s nice, but no. Not like that.”

“Then what is your type? Are you seeing anyone right now?”

This all seems very forward to Yuuri, but it wouldn’t be the first time that Western social standards have clashed against his Japanese upbringing. Maybe Victor’s hoping Yuuri will accidentally admit to that tweet he's been trying _not_ to think about all morning? Or just fishing for gossip? Yuuri is deliberately very private about his personal life – not that’s ever been much to talk about in the first place, and certainly nothing worth the notice of someone with as glamorous a dating life as Victor enjoys.

“Are you?” he asks, turning the question around unanswered.

Victor blinks, surprised. “Well, the paparazzi have spotted me having dinner twice now with Tatiana Krosko.”

Yuuri recognizes the name. She’s a Russian pop singer who had a couple of hits in Japan last year, and a recent scandal for… something or other. He’s not the type to follow celebrity gossip, aside from news about Victor. He hadn’t heard about this new relationship, but it’s not all that surprising. Victor’s dated plenty of people over the years that Yuuri’s been following him, all of them just as famous and glamorous as he is. Still, he can’t quite bite back a flash of disappointment. “Oh. Is she nice?”

“She needs a new record label after getting giving her now-ex a handjob in the audience of a Russian Fashion Week show, so she’s at least compliant with my publicist’s guidelines,” Victor says with a shrug, polishing off the last of his vegetables. “Not all of them are, which can get awkward.”

“I… what?”

“Sorry, that sounded bitter, didn’t it? Tatiana’s honestly very sweet, and slut-shaming is such an ugly double standard. I’m really quite happy to help repair her image.”

“I don’t understand. Are you dating her or not?”

“We’re press dating. You know, when you’re seen together in public with someone else for a few months to boost both your profiles and give the tabloids something to talk about?” Victor pauses, genuine surprise written across his features. “Surely your publicist has discussed the option with you. There must be dozens of idols hoping to have their name attached to Japan’s Ace!”

Yuuri shakes his head. “Japanese idols don’t date, it’s in their contracts. And besides, I don’t have a publicist.”

Victor’s jaw literally drops open for a moment, before he manages to recover his composure. “Seriously? You must be the only person in the top ten of the senior circuit who  _doesn't_  have one!”

First off, Yuuri is not in the top ten. Yes, technically he finished eight at last year’s Worlds, but that doesn’t count. Secondly, Celestino has never mentioned anything like this to Yuuri before. Well, aside from those twenty-odd emails about various press relations agencies over the summer. But that can’t be the same thing Victor is talking about. Third, he can hardly believe that all the other senior skaters are doing things like fake-dating famous people for press coverage. Christophe Giacometti, maybe – the man is shameless – but that’s about it. 

Victor is continuing to vocalize his astonishment at this discovery. To Yuuri’s mortification, he’s not doing so very quietly. “This explains so much! No wonder you don’t have the level of sponsorship a skater of your qualities ought to. Not to mention your press coverage! I’d wondered why you weren’t getting profiled in bigger magazines.”

“Hey.” Yuuri’s pride bristles at that remark. “International Figure Skating did a feature on me last year.”

“I meant outlets like GQ and People,” he says and, oh yes, Victor has been featured in both of those, more than once. “You don’t think I get my coverage by _accident_ , do you?”

Victor sounds horrified at the very thought, and Yuuri can’t help but blurt out, “Be serious, Victor. Who _wouldn’t_ want to read about you?”

He’s said too much. His eyes close, summoning a sinkhole. A zombie apocalypse. Anything, really, to erase the past five seconds of his life. When he opens them again, Victor is leaning towards him, his bright blue eyes fixed on Yuuri’s face like it holds all the secrets of the universe.

“Me,” he breathes out, low and suggestive. “I’d rather read about you.”

Yuuri’s fingers dig into the meat of his thighs under the table. It’s too much. Victor is too much and too close and they’re far too public for what he wants to do, which is to drag that perfect face close with a fistful of that tight t-shirt and kiss him over the remains of their mutually unsatisfying breakfasts. There is no way Victor really means this, the coy remarks and sultry looks he’s been shooting Yuuri’s direction since they met yesterday. Whether Victor means it or not, Yuuri is going to break either way, so he shuts down and focuses on trying to just hold it together.

“Sorry! Sorry, I forgot,” says Victor, pulling back onto his side of the table and glancing away. “I didn’t mean to be weird.”

Yuuri wants to reassure him, but first he wants to get his nerves back under control, so that’s what he does for a few minutes. The waitress clears their table and he dimly hears Victor in the background putting the meal on his room tab but he’s still too busy trying to breathe to object.

“Yuuri?” Victor asks, placing one warm hand on Yuuri’s shoulder. “What can I do? Do you want to go back to your room now?”

What Yuuri wants is to go back to Victor’s room and enact scenarios eight through thirty-one on his _Victor Nikiforov Filthy Fantasies_ chart (Phichit helped him make it; glitter and tequila were involved), but there is no way Victor the actual person needs to know about that. “Yeah,” he manages. “I think I should.”

Victor hovers in the elevator, radiating nervous energy. Yuuri feels incredibly guilty about making his idol feel awkward on a competition day. Victor should be focusing on his short program, not wasting his energy on Yuuri’s weakness. Still, he’s not strong enough to object when Victor insists on walking him to his hotel room door.

"Look, I know this is weird, because we’re competitors, and we don’t really know each other, but...” Victor stares at something just past Yuuri’s shoulder, his eyes swirling with emotions that Yuuri can’t quite identify. “I'd like to say something, if you don't mind?”

Yuuri could listen to Victor Nikiforov read a St. Petersburgh phone book circa 1992 and still be enthralled.

Instead of saying that incredibly foolish thing, he just nods.

“I’m sorry that I’m bad at being a friend,” Victor says, and there’s a warble in his voice that draws Yuuri’s attention. “I know that I keep saying the wrong things and being generally awful but I really, really hope you’ll give me another chance.”

“What are you talking about?” Yuuri asks, trying his best not to openly gape. “No, Victor, that’s not it at all! You’re fine, you’re more than fine, you’re great! I’m the one who’s awful! I’m…”

Yuuri squeezes his eyes shut, trying to summon up strength from the darkness. The worst thing he can imagine doing is letting Victor know just how weak and useless he really is, but then again, he’s already done that with his meltdown at the rink. And honestly, the absolute worst thing he could do would be to let Victor keep blaming himself for something that is Yuuri’s fault.

“I’m not a good friend. Really. I’m anxious and insecure and always stuck in my own head. I have no idea why Phichit puts up with me, and almost every other friend I have in Detroit is someone who’s really just friends with Phichit and I’m, like, an accessory to that. So _please_ don’t worry. This is all my fault.”

That was… a lot. Yuuri’s half-afraid to open his eyes, because maybe Victor won’t even be standing there anymore. But standing in front of his hotel room door with his eyes squeezed shut is a level of awkward that even Katsuki Yuuri can’t maintain forever.

When he does look up, Victor is still there. His expression is soft, almost vulnerable.

“I have an idea. If we’re both terrible friends for other people, maybe we’d be good friends for each other?”

The logic doesn’t quite parse, but Yuuri isn’t dumb enough to try and argue the point. This isn’t Philosophy 101, this is Victor Effing Nikiforov taking Yuuri’s phone and tapping in his contact information, then sending an SMS to his own phone.

“I really should run,” Victor says with an apologetic smile. “Yakov’s expecting me. But I’ll be in touch, if that’s okay?”

Yuuri nods, clutching his phone to his chest as he watches Victor – and Victor’s perfect, perfect ass – stride down the hallway and vanish into the elevator. He keeps it there, pressed against his heart, as he stumbles into his hotel room, where Phichit is still asleep, and falls face-first onto his bed.

Burying his face in his pillow, he screams.

 

* * *

 

Phichit wasn’t particularly happy about being woken up before his alarm by the sound of his roommate screaming into a pillow. However, once Yuuri explained what had happened – that Victor Effing Nikiforov declared them to be friends and gave Yuuri his personal cellphone number – Phichit wasted no time getting in on the screaming.

“OMG Yuuri! Victor is definitely into you!”

Yuuri shook his head, worrying at the edge of the bed’s comforter with his nails. “I think he’s just….”

 _Lonely_ is what Yuuri had wanted to say, but he’s not sure if that’s true, and if it is, he’s not sure that it’s his place to tell other people. There was a confessional element to things Victor had said to him that morning – the things that he’d said to Victor in return – and telling someone else, even someone as close as his best friend, feels like a betrayal of that trust.

“He’s nice,” Yuuri finally comes up with. “And none of the skaters he usually hangs out with are here.”

“Uh-huh,” replies Phichit, hitting Yuuri with some solid side-eye. “So he got up at four a.m. to just _hang out_ with you? No way. That is a maximum thirst move. Also, he spent a lot of time checking out your ass, and I don’t just mean at the rink.”

Yuuri can’t explain the four a.m. thing without bringing up Victor’s insomnia which, again, feels too private to share. Also, Phichit is now scrolling through his photos from last night, most of which are stealth photos of Victor and Yuuri stretching on the floor. Phichit keeps zooming in on Victor’s expression, then showing the angle between his eyes and whatever part of Yuuri’s anatomy he’s looking at which, yes, if you accepted Phichit’s analysis, would be Yuuri’s butt.

Privately, Yuuri thinks that’s because his butt is so large, it’s hard to look in his general direction without it getting in your line of sight. But he knows saying so out loud will result in Phichit playing Thick Thighs and/or Big Butts on repeat until Yuuri admits that maybe some people find his particular weight distribution attractive. It’s too early in the morning for either Sir Mix-a-Lot or Willam, so he keeps his mouth shut.

“You should ask him on a date,” Phichit says, decorating a photo of Victor pushing Yuuri into a side split stretch with heart emojis and texting it to Yuuri’s phone. Their faces are really close together. Yuuri reminds himself that’s just how assisted stretches sometimes work. “Tonight. After the short.”

Yuuri now knows that Victor Nikiforov, five-time world champion, will go straight from the post-program media scrum to his bed. And not in the fun way. Another thing he can’t explain and _woah_ , when did he start having secrets from Phichit? “There’s no way he’d want to go on a date with me. Please be serious.”

“I am! Let’s look at the facts. One, he got up at four a.m. to go skating with you. Two, he hung out with you last night when he could have been doing literally anything else. And three, he knows that you thirst tweeted about him and he’s still here, which means the thirst is absolutely mutual.”

Yuuri knows that first one doesn’t really count. Neither does the second. As for the third… no, just. No.

“We’re in Milwaukee,” Yuuri points out. “I seriously doubt their nightlife lives up to Victor Nikiforov’s standards. Also, he would not be talking to me if he knew I was the source of that tweet.”

Phichit waggles his eyebrows. “I rest my case. Trust me, he knows.”

“He doesn’t!” Yuuri insists, because the only other option is spontaneous human combustion. “You were hugely popular in the junior circuit and you’re already Instagram mutuals with two thirds of the international seniors. I’ve seen people tell you their deepest, darkest secrets less than five minutes after meeting you. Everyone trusts you, even though they totally shouldn’t. That means, as far as Victor is concerned, it could be anyone!”

“Mm-hmm. You keep telling yourself that.”

Yuuri plans to. “Shouldn’t you be thinking about the competition and not my non-existent sex life?”

“I can multi-task!” Phichit says, ruffling Yuuri’s hair as he heads towards the bathroom. “Which is why I now have two goals for this weekend: to bring home a medal for me, and to make sure you and Victor are both properly hydrated.”

“Phichit,” Yuuri groans, flopping back on his bed and burying his face under his pillow again. “You are the worst.”

“Remember to thank me at your wedding!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Insomnia is a common co-condition with depression, and it's one that I personally experience, which is why I gave it to Victor here. A lot of people hc Victor as a morning person, so I thought the "unable to stay asleep" version of insomnia made sense.
> 
> The "If we're both terrible friends, then maybe we'd be good together" is a riff on a scene from [The Undiscovered Country](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11941542/chapters/26995563), by [shysweetthing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shysweetthing/pseuds/shysweetthing), who is also the source of the phrase _Victor Effing Nikiforov_. I love their writing so, so much and I highly recommend checking out their works if you haven't already!
> 
> I feel like I've gone a bit OC with the degree to which Victor and Yuuri are actually able to vocalize their feelings in this, but ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ I have also lost total control of the projected chapter count; I'm hoping to keep it under 8, but again, ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ is my life motto.
> 
> Thanks so much to everyone who's commented/kudo'ed, I really appreciate it!


	4. Taking Gold in the Nikiforov Grand Thirst Prix

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victor has offered friendship and Yuuri is going to be Fine. He can handle this. Friendship. With Victor Effing Nikiforov. 
> 
> Except the media's never met an off-handed remark they can't turn into a ten thousand word article, leading to embarrassment, far too many notifications, and a social media mess beyond even Phichit's capacity to manage. Time to call in the professionals!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for the delay, and also for the way this is taking a hard right into crack fic territory. Although the original premise is also pretty ridiculous, so I guess it all fits?
> 
> Releveé is a ballet term for going up on the balls of your feet, btw.

Yuuri usually keeps his phone notifications turned off. Logically, he knows each tiny ping is just Phichit sending him another stupid meme, or Celestino reminding him of some temporary change to his training schedule. Even so, the anxious part of Yuuri’s brain always leaps to the worst-case scenarios, especially when he gets more than one or two notifications in under a minute. Every chime becomes an alert that someone has gotten hurt, or died, or decided that Yuuri is a terrible person and must be told all his failings in excruciating detail right away. As such, it’s best for everyone if Yuuri’s phone lives in silence.

This is how Yuuri manages to miss both the first forty-nine text messages that Victor Nikiforov sends him, along with the Google alert that heralds his doom.

Yuuri’s mostly stuck to the plan that Celestino had given him for the day: an hour-long conditioning run, another hour of weights at a nearby gym, a healthy lunch and two hours of shared ice time at MSOE Kern Center. The later is filled, as Yuuri had feared, with hockey players, five of whom try to make small talk with Yuuri either during his practice or when he’s cooling down afterwards. This happens at the Detroit rink too and is never not confusing to Yuuri. Phichit, of course, thinks its hilarious.

Phichit is the reason Yuuri finally checks his phone, since Yuuri needs to let his roommate know that he’s running late to watch his practice. The blame falls to an especially persistent hockey player who kept trying to get Yuuri’s advice about long-distance relationships, of all things. Yuuri doesn’t have any experience with relationships, close or distant, which should be blindingly obvious. Hockey players are so weird. He’s just planning on sending Phichit a quick ‘on my way’ message, when the splatter of red across his phone screen catches his eye.

Every single one of his social media apps has a bright 99+ notification warning splashed over the icon.

What. The. Fuck?

Yuuri never uses Twitter or Instagram, despite his roommate’s best efforts, and his Facebook only exists so he can like Yuuko’s updates on the triplets. He rarely gets this many texts, unless it’s right after a competition, and he _never_  gets this many emails. There must be some kind of glitch.

Tentatively, he opens Twitter first, which is a mistake. He can barely follow the non-linear shit-posting style of the app at the best of times, and right now it’s beyond baffling. He catches glimpses of his face on a few images and quickly exits the program: Phichit has taught him enough about memes to know that nothing Yuuri considers good will ever come of them.

He tries email next. There are… a _lot_  of emails from reporters he’s never heard of, the subject lines asking politely for a quote. He’s still not sure what they want to quote him about, at least not until he scrolls down enough to see the kanji for his sister’s name in the ‘from’ column.

_Subject: The world finally knows our pain_

_Email: Hey Yuuri,_

_These reporters keeping clogging up the onsen’s phone line. Please give them a quote and put me out of their misery, okay? You have twenty-four hours or I release the photo from your 14 th birthday._

_Love,_

_Mari_

Fear chills down Yuuri’s spine. He remembers all too vividly the Nikiforov poster that his sister had given him on that birthday, and the way he had far too enthusiastically kissed said poster before realizing that his older sibling was aiming her deadly polaroid camera in his direction. A strict pact of mutually assured sibling destruction is all that’s kept the photo’s existence a darkly concealed secret for the last decade. If Mari was willing to risk the exposure of her brief and unspeakably awkward foray into gothic lolita fashion, things must be serious.

Fortunately, unlike the rest of the world, his sister knows him well enough to realize that context is crucial. She’s provided a link that lets Yuuri understand exactly why his world is falling apart on this otherwise normal Saturday afternoon.

 

* * *

 

**Buzzfeed Investigates: Who Wins Gold in the Nikiforov Grand Thirst Prix?**

As revealed in a recent Buzzfeed Presents Video, Thai skater Phichit Chulanot claims that at least one professional skater currently on the senior competitive circuit is only there due to an impressive level of thirst directed at the Living Legend himself, Russian skater Victor Nikiforov. (In case you’re not aware of Nikiforov and why he’d inspire such dedication, check out our photo gallery of his twelve hottest performances.)

[embedded tweet] _True thirst is spending ten years becoming an internationally ranked male singles skater just so you can ogle Victor Nikiforov’s butt in person._  - @Phichuchu (Phichit Chulanot)

Naturally, this prompted skating fans around the world to investigate, hoping to figure out the identity of this impressively motivated skater. Buzzfeed has rounded up the top ten contenders and assigned each a ranking based on the available evidence…

 

* * *

 

Yuuri is sitting backstage at the competition rink for Skate America, staring blankly out at the ice. Phichit is still practicing. So is Victor Nikiforov.

The fact that Yuuri cannot bring himself to focus on either of these things is a Very Bad Sign.

He’d read the Buzzfeed article on his way over to the rink and has been trying to compose a coherent response ever since. Considering that his brain was nothing but the flatline noise you heard on TV medical dramas when somebody plot-important died, it wasn’t surprising that he hadn’t come up with anything useful yet.

Because of course, the name at the very top of that list was Katsuki Yuuri. He wasn’t the only skater that fans had suggested – Mila Babicheva, Emil Nikoli, Michelle and Sara Crispino, J.J. Leroy, even Phichit had been thrown into the mix – but he was the one with the most damning evidence. Video clips of him at 14 and 16 and 18, before he’d learned to tone down his enthusiasm about the other skater in front of the media. All those interviews where he’d cited Nikiforov as his inspiration, where he’d babbled about the man’s grace and athleticism and costumes. Comparisons of his own routines over the years, people pointing out all the little moves and flourishes he’d absorbed from years of watching Victor.

That photo of Phichit in the hallway of their apartment, his own bedroom door half-open and three posters of Nikiforov visible on the wall inside.

The worst part was that they weren’t wrong. Yuuri would never have been so stubborn, so determined, so dedicated to his skating, without Victor’s example to guide him onwards. Not that he would have given up; he loved the ice for reasons that went beyond Victor, reasons that were woven into his very bones. But would he have left his family, his friends, his hometown, without the beacon of Victor to follow?

Maybe not.

Even so, the mountain of evidence is upsetting. That photo is from two years ago, buried in the depths of Phichit’s hyper-active Instagram account. The older videos are from Japanese television, mostly local news coverage shot after regional competitions. According to Buzzfeed, all the links were supplied by his fan forum, which was not even a thing Yuuri had realized existed until now. He’s a dime-a-dozen skater who’s stumbled into a couple of national gold medals, that’s all. He shouldn’t have fans, let alone a whole forum of them.

Especially not a whole forum of them who were apparently obsessed with him the way he’s obsessed with Victor, complete with an encyclopedic recall of even his oldest media interviews. He wonders if they are all weird, shut-in stalkers. Which makes him wonder if _he_  is a weird, shut-in stalker. Obviously not the shut-in part, since he’s currently at a skating rink in Milwaukee, but the weird stalker bit? Probably.

The whole thing makes him feel more than a little nauseous. Based on the time-stamp from Mari’s email, he has twenty-one hours left to make a pubic statement and take the pressure off the onsen’s phone lines.

(He’s counting. Of course he’s counting. His sister has never been one for idle threats.)

Yuuri is still in a fugue state when practice wraps up. Phichit doesn’t notice at first, slipping on his skate guards and begging Celestino for his phone back. He has the device in his hands for twelve hot seconds before he rushes over to Yuuri’s side.

“Oh shit. Are you okay?”

Yuuri responds with a vague half-shrug that does nothing to dispel the impression of a comatose potato that he’s currently giving off.

“I am so sorry that things got this out of hand,” says Phichit, kneeling before Yuuri and grabbing his hands. “I know I’m competing in a few hours, but I will find a way to fix this, I promise.”

“It’s not your fault, Peach.”

“It is.” Phichit has his _do-not-fuck-with-me_  voice on. Yuuri likes that voice. It’s the sound of his best friend going all protective on some drunken club kid who’s getting handsy when Yuuri just wants to dance. That voice always makes him feel safe, even now. “This is secret roomie insider knowledge that I blabbed to the whole internet, and it’s my job to make things better.”

“Why? Turns out I’ve been blabbing about it to everyone for years. Way before we met.”

“Is everything okay?” asks a familiar voice with a way-too-sexy Russian accent. Yuuri doesn’t need to look up to know that Victor is standing behind Phichit. He can recognize the man’s kneecaps, and isn’t _that_  pathetic? “Yuuri, are you all right?”

“He’s fine,” says Phichit, rising to his full stature and positioning himself between Victor and Yuuri. It’s more than a little ridiculous, given their relative heights, but Yuuri appreciates the gesture. “I’ve got it under control.”

Victor frowns. “I’d like to hear that from Yuuri himself, if you don’t mind.”

Yuuri’s hands are cold now that Phichit’s not holding on to them. He shoves them under his thighs and takes a deep breath.

“I’m fine. I mean, apparently I’m a weird stalker, but so are my fans? Which is not a thing that should exist? And they told Buzzfeed everything? Which I don’t understand, because why would anyone even care? But anyway, yes, I’m fine.”

Yuuri pauses to breath again, because that’s not a thing he did during that entire ramble and oh god, sitting on his hands like this is probably making his stupid thighs look so wide. He pops his feet up to a releveé position, so that his muscles are hanging loose and not spread flat against the bench any more. He’s a little embarrassed by how much better that makes him feel.

Victor taps his fingertip against his lips, which is something he really needs to stop doing if he wants Yuuri to be able to compose rational thoughts in his presence, and hums. “Ah! So it’s a media thing. I’ll contact my publicist, I’m sure she can help fill in the gaps until you hire one of your own.”

“You really don’t need to…”

Victor finishes tapping on his phone and cuts off Yuuri’s protest with a sharp smile. “It’s already done. Yulia’s great, you’ll like her.”

“Victor.” Stern. Old. Russian. Before Yuuri even looks, he knows who he’ll see standing just to his left. Yakov Feltsman unleashes a string of sharp Russian, which crashes against the bulwark of Victor’s indifference. “Now!”

“Da, da,” Victor replies, leaning over to brush a concerned finger across Yuuri’s cheek. “I have to nap now, and then competition. Text me, okay? And trust Yulia when she calls.”

The echo of Victor’s fingertips lingers for hours, like a kiss from a ghost.

 

* * *

 

Celestino demands an explanation from the two of them, once Phichit has done his stretches and changed into a clean track suit. They’re eating a terrible dinner of pre-packaged salad with grilled chicken in one of the locker rooms, since there’s only a few hours between the practice session and competition, and Celestino listens like he’s on the edge of a perpetual eye-roll as Phichit tries to untangle the threads which led to their current flaming trash heap.

When they’re done, Celestino stares at the ceiling for three full minutes before speaking. “Okay. Yuuri, Victor said his publicist would help you navigate this situation. I want you to take her call and follow her advice this weekend. On Monday, when we’re back in Detroit, you’re going to contact at least three of the publicity agencies I sent you last summer and sign with one by the end of the week, got it? This is not negotiable.”

Yuuri nods, eyes fixed on the floor. On top of all his other embarrassments, now he’s embarrassed to be causing his coach this much hassle, especially right at the start of Phichit’s competition. “Okay.”

“Phichit, you’re giving me your phone now and you’re not getting it back until after the Free Skate,” Celestino says, throwing up a flat expression against Phichit’s astonished glare. “No debate. I know you feel responsible for this situation, but I need you focused on the ice, not Yuuri. Can you do that?”

Phichit looks like he’s about to argue, until Yuuri reaches over and squeezes his shoulder in reassurance. “Got it, coach.”

“Great. Now, let’s get you that medal.”

 

* * *

 

Phichit does well with his short program, grabbing the top spot in the rankings for a moment. He’ll likely be knocked down – there are still five skaters to go, after all – but he waves and laughs from the kiss and cry, demanding that Celestino take a dozen selfies using his confiscated phone. Yuuri screams and waves from his spot in the skaters’ viewing area, waving a tiny Thai flag until his wrists throb in protest.

A few more skaters and Victor is up. Yuuri’s phone lights up with a call from an unknown number, but Yuuri sends it to voicemail. He’ll deal with it later. He’s only seen Victor perform in person once before, an ice show in New York that involved a dreadful bus ride, an even worse hostel and nosebleed seats. This is competition, though. This is different. Yuuri can sense it as Victor takes the ice, the intensity of his focus drawing the audience in, leaving them breathless with anticipation.

Victor’s skating is sublime. His theme this year is passion, and his short program resonates with it, a cheery pop song about first love that he’s paired with sharp, visceral choreography. There’s a mournful quality to his step sequences that shouldn’t work, contrasting as it does with the innocence of the music, but it does. Yuuri realizes half-way through that Victor’s not skating the initial spark of young love but how it looks from a distance, a bruised and jaded heart recalling what was once so bright and hopeful. Yuuri watches him soar across the ice, landing a quad flip so neat and clean that he almost bites through his bottom lip with longing, and feels his body thrum with passions of his own.

Once the ice has settled, Victor’s in first and Phichit, astonishingly, has held onto third. Yuuri’s chest fills up with a bubbling warmth to see his friend’s name so high in the rankings, the bright Thai flag sitting just above the stars-and-stripes. Leo’s in fourth, but the hometown crowd is still going wild for their American star. Michele Crispino, the Italian skater, is second, miles below Victor in points but far enough ahead that he’ll be hard to catch in the free skate. There’s maybe a fifteen point spread between third and eighth place, which means Phichit has a real fight on his hands if he wants to grab that bronze medal. But for now, his best friend is third after skating on the same ice as Victor Effing Nikiforov, and Yuuri is going to savor that joy with all that he can.

He’s on his way to meet Phichit and Celestino backstage when he remembers the voicemail.

“Mr. Katsuki? This is Yulia Alexeev,” says a crisp female voice with only the faintest hint of a Russian accent. “My client Victor Nikiforov has requested that I assist you with a media relations issue. As time is of the essence, please call me back at your earliest convenience.”

Yuuri hates talking to strangers, hates the whole awkward dance of trying not to be accidentally offensive when you have no idea what the other person is like. He also hates phone calls. It’s hard enough to talk to people when you can read their body language, but when it’s just a disembodied voice drifting through space? Impossible.

Talking to strangers over the phone is literally the nexus point of two personal hells for Yuuri. Still, he remembers Mari’s threat (sixteen hours to go) and that’s enough to push him to find a quiet-ish corner of the rink’s ISU-restricted zone and call her back.

“Mr. Katsuki, it’s good to speak with you,” says Yulia Alexeev over the weird, distant hum of a long-distance cell call. “Victor has provided me with the basics of your situation, and my team is ready to act once we have your approval to do so.”

She’s very… professional. Sharp and smart, cutting to the heart of the matter in a manner that Yuuri supposes many people would find comforting. He is, because he always is, mildly freaked out.

“He, uh, did?” is what he manages to stutter out after a far-too-long pause.

“Yuuri.” Her voice shifts to a warmer, more friendly tone. Yuuri feels a little like a cat being coaxed closer by someone who is planning to flip him over and rub his belly the second he lets down his guard. “Please do not worry. I could tell you a dozen stories of ill-advised, even scandalous things Victor has done since becoming famous.”

 _Yes please,_  his brain unhelpfully supplies. The gossip about Victor is already pretty steamy, so trying to imagine scenarios salacious enough that Victor paid his publicist to cover them up is going to fuel Yuuri’s late-night shower sessions for months.

“You have never heard of these incidents, even if you are as much of a fan as the media suggests.” Yulia continues. “And I am the reason for that. I have helped Victor and I can help you now.”

“Oh. Uh, okay?”

“We have two paths ahead of us,” says Yulia, as if she has not just lit the match to explode an entire bank of sexual fantasy fireworks in Yuuri’s hindbrain. “Path one, we insist the media has gotten the story wrong. We issue a standard rebuttal, we run a social media counter-campaign, and the whole thing dies down in a month, more or less. Path two, we lean in, and your career enjoys the profile boost.”

“What?”

Yulia sighs loudly enough that Yuuri can hear her through the terrible trans-Atlantic phone signal. “Victor mentioned you are lacking in sponsorships, yes? Media coverage can change that. So, we create a campaign designed to capitalize on how interesting the media finds you. Play along for a few months, create a compelling story, and boom! More sponsor offers than you can handle.”

Yuuri has four main sponsors right now, companies that sell athletic wear, sports drink, hair gel and pre-packaged ramen, all of whom he is careful to never insult in public. They’re all Japanese, which is nice, but also limiting. He’s not an idiot. International brands have a lot more to offer athletes, both in terms of raw cash and other perks. Victor’s done ads for both Aeroflot and Cathay Pacific; he probably hasn’t paid for his own flights in years.

“What.” He stops himself for a moment, taking a deep breath. “What would ‘playing along’ look like?”

“Our team has drafted a couple of different scenarios,” Yulia says. Yuuri really hopes the breathless excitement in her voice is just him projecting. He wants to like this woman and knowing that she’s thrilled about his ongoing public humiliation is going to make that difficult. “Simply emphasizing your personal drive has a significant fan engagement rate, to the level where we’d estimate between fifty to one hundred thousand in endorsement deals over the next twelve months. American currency. We take a percentage, of course, but our fees are quite reasonable.”

Yuuri was grateful to be leaning against a wall, because his knees buckled at that. He’s been barely scraping by for so long, acutely aware of the costs that came along with his dream. The idea that he could reverse the flow, could be making money instead of just pouring it all out on coaching fees and other expenses, was so shocking that it made his eyes water.

“The preferred scenario, of course, is one where that drive pays off in a dreams-come-true, movie-of-the-week way. Victor’s already agreed, and our projections for _that_ scenario ballpark at five hundred thousand to one million in sponsorships and media appearance fees, and that’s just within the first six to nine months.”

“What.” He can’t bring himself to take a breath, just stands there numb and silent as she explains.

“The story you’re poised to tell, that of a small-town boy who makes a name for himself on the international stage through sheer hard work and sacrifice, is already appealing but not particularly unique, especially in athletics. Add in the romance angle that you’ve done it all to meet your idol? A bit better, but still lacking. Fighting your way to the top so you can meet said idol, only to have him fall for you? Pure gold.”

He remembers the faintly pained look on Victor’s face during breakfast as he’d explained about the Russian pop star he’s been seeing for publicity, and all the pieces fall into place.

Victor has offered to fake-date Yuuri in order to help him through this media disaster.

Victor is the nicest, kindest, sweetest person in the entire world and he is absolutely breaking Yuuri’s heart.

“I can’t do that,” he stammers out.

“If you’re worried about Victor, don’t be. He’s the one who suggested the idea in the first place,” Yulia says. “His current commitment is scheduled to wrap in three weeks, but I’m certain we can negotiate for an immediate close. We lay the groundwork this weekend with some social media – Instagram cross-posting, mutual selfies, that sort of thing – and we can have you plausibly together by early November, right before your second qualifier. If you can make it into the final, which Victor assures me you can, you could easily be ringing in the new year with an extra quarter million in your bank account.”

Yuuri stares at the flat concrete overhead. This whole rink is built of the substance, reliable and functional and utterly devoid of any aesthetic appeal. It reminds Yuuri of his own athletic career: sturdy but underwhelming. He’s never going to win prize money like that on his own, never going to make the kind of impact that gets six-figure deals and billboards. Hell, he couldn’t afford socks if Mizuno didn’t send him a fresh box twice a year.

He thinks about his parents, working themselves ragged to keep the onsen going. He thinks about Mari, how she insists that she’d changed her mind about wanting to travel even though they all know it’s a lie. He thinks about the dog and the triplets he hasn’t seen in five years, because even when he’s in Japan for Nationals, the flight south from Tokyo or Sapporo or even Osaka is too expensive. He thinks about Yuuko trying to put on a brave face when the Ice Castle Zamboni malfunctioned twice last summer. He thinks of the thousand little hurts he could ease with that much money.

He thinks about Victor, and his own glass heart.

“I need some time,” he says. “To consider.”

“I get that, but we do need to get on top of this quickly.”

Yuuri thinks of Mari’s deadline. Who knows? If he does this, maybe the photo will have to be released anyway, proof of Katsuki Yuuri’s humiliating life path for strangers to coo over. The idea makes him want to crawl into a deep, dark hole and never come out.

“I know. How much time can you give me?”

He can hear Yulia hum down the line, a slightly lower vibration than the weird dead air that backgrounds their call. “Two hours? Talk to Victor, he can explain how things work.”

“Okay.” Yuuri stares at the concrete ceiling, the bright lines of blue paint around the tops of the walls that are supposed to make the endless pale grey look more appealing. “I’ll get back to you soon. And, uh, thank you.”

Yuuri hangs up and stares at his phone in disbelief. A total stranger just promised him that he could earn half a million dollars. By dating his life-long idol, the hottest man alive. This… this should be easy.

It’s not.

Yuuri is private. His feelings are private, not easily shared even with those closest to him. It had taken two years and six shots of vodka for him to confess to his best friend that maybe, just maybe, he admired Victor for something more than his skating. He still hasn’t said it to Yuuko in any kind of open, honest way, although they both know.

The idea of standing in front of a media scrum and saying those words into a microphone makes his knees shake. The idea of taking those feelings and turning them into a commodity _hurts_.

Yes, he’s a lust-crazed fool when it comes to Victor, but that’s not the whole of it. He aches for the man. He always has. The longing goes deeper than the way Victor looks in a poster and moves on the ice. It’s a low throbbing that’s woven into Yuuri’s very marrow, as much a part of his body’s music as his own heartbeat. He yearns to understand him, to connect with the soul that makes so much beauty and offers it so freely to the world. He wants to know why Victor started skating and what keeps him going, the precise technique he uses to tape over his blisters and how he resists the food cravings they all have. He wants to know the faces Victor makes when he’s planning new choreography and the ones he makes watching trashy TV. He wants it all, wants to know him so well that there isn’t a single secret between them.

Until now, he’s never really considered what he might have to trade for that knowledge.

Not that this would be anything like what Yuuri really wants. Even if he could survive the embarrassment of spilling open his secret heart, what he’d get in return would be fake. A performance. Dinners for the paparazzi. Kisses where the media could catch them. The hidden truth of his life capped off with a public lie.

Seen like that, the answer is obvious.

Obvious and so, so selfish. Yuuri’s not the only one who made sacrifices in the pursuit of this dream. His family has given up so much for him, without a whisper of complaint. After all these years, he’s been offered a chance to pay them back. Can he really turn that down, just because he’s afraid that he’s too weak to see it through? Because the idea of fake-dating Victor for three months and then letting him go makes Yuuri want to curl up like a pillbug and never unfurl? He should be stronger than that.

Bouncing all this around his head isn’t getting him any closer to an answer. Gathering up the scattered bits of his brain, he makes his way out of the rink and towards their hotel. He needs a sounding board, someone who can help his chaotic mind sort reality from the ridiculous.

His thoughts immediately go to Phichit and then promptly reminds him what an absolute asshole move that would be. Phichit just earned third place in the short at his very first seniors Grand Prix event. He’s celebrating. His best friend should be celebrating with him, or at the very least, not dragging Phichit into dealing with a media disaster that is only happening because Yuuri is incapable of keeping his drool to himself.  

He thinks about calling Yuuko or Mari; the former is always sympathetic and insightful, while he can count on his sister for bullshit reduction and tough love. Explaining this mess to either of them feels impossible.

Celestino is a laughable idea. Minako would tell him to take the money and rail Victor on the nearest horizontal surface in the process. There’s really only one person he can talk to about this with even a shred of honesty, even if they are the last person he wants to discuss this with.

He opens Victor’s forty-nine text messages. Which… woah. He’d forgotten there were so many, and that’s a jarring realization. He skims through them, smiling. Victor spent the morning complaining about his media interviews. There’s a whole thread where he proposes increasingly ridiculous replies to the question “Are you hoping to win gold at Skate America?” starting from “No, I love to lose” and continuing through to “I’m hoping aliens arrive during my free skate and beam me up to their ship, I think that would be quite surprising for the audience”. He shares a photo of his lunch, another nutritionist-prepared flavor catastrophe, followed by ten texts about the foods he is most excited to eat when he retires. McDonald’s breakfast sandwiches are on that list and Yuuri’s heart clenches at the thought of a lifetime deprived of Sausage McMuffins.

The last few texts are spaced farther apart, as if the sender is becoming slowly aware of the silence from the other end. The last message is a single word – _sorry_  – sent right before the men’s practice session began.

Yuuri winces. He’s almost at the hotel. _Hey, are you still up?_ he types, hitting send before he can second-guess himself.

 _Yes!!!_  is the immediate reply.

_Can I come see you?_

Yuuri takes a deep breath, entering the hotel elevator. He pauses, not sure what button he should hit.

_Anytime ;)_

Two minutes later, he is knocking on Victor’s hotel room door.

“Aren't you excited?” Victor says, bouncing on his toes as he opens up for Yuuri. The gesture makes Victor look like an overeager puppy and Yuuri’s struck with a stab of longing for Vicchan. In addition to a name, his idol and his dog seem to share the same guileless joy at greeting him. "It's going to be such a surprise!"

“Victor,” Yuuri says, leaning a hand against the door frame to support himself. “I don’t think I can do this.”

The door frame helps with the physical buckling in his legs but not at all with the emotional collapse that follows his words. He is an idiot. 

Victor, thankfully, looks equally dumbstruck. “Will you at least come in? So we can talk?”

Yuuri nods, stepping into the room and kicking off his sneakers at the threshold. He tries to dispel his nerves by focusing on Victor, which is a mistake. Victor is clearly getting ready for bed, his skin clear and a little glossy from whatever product he’s applied. He’s dressed casually, a pair of loose black sleep pants with his red-and-white team jacket half-zipped over top. Yuuri has had far too many fantasies about that jacket to be allowed within grabbing distance of it in real life. He closes his eyes for a second, swallowing down both his nerves and his overwhelming desire to jam his tongue into Victor's mouth.

This train of thought refuses to be derailed, so Yuuri sighs and accepts the fact that he's going to have this already awkward conversation with the melody of his own perverted thoughts playing in the background of his brain like some debauched calliope tune.

"I mean, I won’t do it,” he blurts out, wincing at how harsh his voice sounds in the echoey silence of the hotel room. He scrambles to make amends. "It was so incredibly kind of you to offer but I can't, I just can't.”

“It's my forehead, isn’t it?”

Victor says this like he’s joking, only he’s touching his hairline with his fingertips as if to reassure himself it hasn’t receded since the last time he looked in a mirror.

“What? No, your forehead is perfect.” He stops before he blurts out _you're perfect_ , but the words start bouncing around in his head anyway, a second harmony alongside the calliope degenerate track.

 _I can't fake date you because it would break my heart for real_ , he can't say. _I have been masturbating to your skate routines since I was 15 and I'm at serious risk of spontaneous orgasm every time you breathe on me_ , he definitely can't say. _I wish you really wanted me_ , is the darkest, truest thought in the tangled brambles of his thorn-thicket brain, and also the thing he will never, ever say.

“It's me,” is what he does say after a too-long silence. “I'm not good with pressure.”

“I would never pressure you to do something you didn't want, Yuuri!” Victor looks shocked and more than a little hurt. “All of that is strictly negotiated well in advance, and I’m happy with whatever limits you choose.”

Yuuri flushes when he realizes the misunderstanding, waving his arms as if he could erase the accusation. “Not like that! I know you would never.”

Victor visibly relaxes at that, and Yuuri feels a pang of guilt. The implication seems to have hit a sore point, which is something Yuuri would want to ask about if he weren’t already in the midst of a different fraught and terrible conversation.

“I meant the pressure of being known as, well, that. With you.”

Victor tilts his head, confused. “The press will be very kind to you, I’m sure. They love this sort of thing! You’ll be like the star in one of those Disney teen films, a modern-day Mia Thermopolis.”

Yuuri crunches up his face, unsure if Victor has forgotten how the media has been trashing on Anne Hathaway lately, or if he’s just making a terrible analogy.

“I can’t. I can’t do this to you. I mean, what if you meet someone amazing, but you’re trapped in this dumb fake relationship and you miss your chance with them?”

Victor straightens, ever so slightly, at that remark, a flash of some indefinable emotion flitting across his face. Yuuri can’t be sure; the lighting in his hotel room is dim, only a potlight in the hallway and the soft glow of a single bedside lamp. At least the darkness hides the blush on his own face.

“I suppose that would be terrible,” Victor says at last, that same indefinable edge in his voice, “Honestly though? Dating like that isn’t an option right now. Not for me.”

Yuuri boggles. “Are you kidding? There are a hundred – no, a thousand people, within blocks of this hotel, who would walk through burning coals for a chance to date Victor Nikiforov.”

“Probably. And they’d all be thinking about what they could get out of it.”

Victor crosses to the room’s minifridge and opens it, his face highlighted for a moment by the soft glow of the internal lights. He pulls out a tiny bottle of vodka, contemplates it, then puts it back.

“No, competition tomorrow. Anyway, the last boy I dated for real sold our private photos to a tabloid. The one before that dumped me once the exposure of being seen with me got him the modelling contract he wanted. Shall I keep going?”

Yuuri remembers those photos. They hadn’t been nudes, simply unguarded moments. Victor in the morning, sleep-mussed and squinting over a coffee mug. Victor in the kitchen, laughing and barefoot, pasta sauce spotting his white shirt. Victor with a frown on his face and Makkachin at his feet, sitting on a park bench and staring into nothing. They were a softer side of the skater, so different from his usual public polish, and Yuuri had treasured them.

Learning that they were a violation, something taken without consent rather than given freely, makes the bottom drop out of his heart. “No, that’s…”

Victor sits on the windowsill, a dark form against the city lights. “Don’t feel bad for me, please. I did this to myself and there are perks. The numbers Yulia talked about aren’t unusual for me, and while that’s not all thanks to tabloid coverage, it certainly helps. Besides, it’d be nice to do this with someone I like for a change.”

“You,” Yuuri pauses, stumbling over the words, over the enormous and overwhelming hope behind them. “You like me?”

Victor’s expression is lost to the backlight of the city beyond the windows. “I do. We’re friends, aren’t we?”

Yuuri nods, a little too vigorously. “Yes. Friends!”

“Come here?” Victor asks, voice uncertain.

Yuuri does, crossing the room and sitting beside him on the windowsill. He pointedly ignores the bed, with its invitingly rumpled sheets. Victor reaches out and takes one hand in his own. Yuuri is incredibly happy but simultaneously wishing he hadn’t, because it’s almost impossible to hear what Victor is saying over the air raid siren of delight that his brain sets off at that touch.

“Look at this from my perspective. My friend has spent years working very, very hard to reach a certain level in his career. He’s come into a spot of trouble, though, and I can help. Not with the work – that’s his and his alone, a success he needs to earn on the ice – but with the rest, the business side. Isn’t that what friends are for?”

Victor’s hands are so warm. Yuuri wants to run his fingertips over the thick callouses he can feel, the ones from weightlifting at the gym and the ones that come from skidding against the ice.

“I don’t want to disappoint you,” he murmurs at last, needing something to break the silence between them. “I’m not that interesting.”

“Want to know a secret?” Victor replies, stifling a yawn. “Neither am I. What the public sees? Everything besides the skating is Yulia’s creation.”

Yuuri is already Victor’s creation, stitched together from posters and programs and years of longing. Yulia’s not going to have much to work with when it comes to shaping him for the press.

“I’m just me.”

“Then stay that way,” Victor says, leaning sideways to pull Yuuri into a partial hug. Their shoulders touch, Victor’s arm slung across the back of his neck, and Yuuri flushes at the sheer heat of Victor’s body touching his. “I promise that I’ll do all I can to protect you. To make it worth your while.”

Yuuri closes his eyes, drinking in the moment. Victor is so solid, where their bodies press together. “You’re really fine with this?”

“I am,” Victor says, half-hiding another yawn. “But only if you are.”

“I need to think about it. And you, you need sleep.”

“I do.” Victor guides Yuuri to the door, still holding his hand. “I’ll be your friend whatever you decide, right? I want you to know that.”

“I do,” he says, impulsively squeezing Victor’s hand once before bending down to slip on his shoes. “We’ll talk tomorrow?”

“I have to focus on my free skate tomorrow, but Sunday?” replies Victor, sleepy contentment shining in his face. “Yakov’s not as strict with gala performances, so I’ll have some time in the morning.”

“Sure, Sunday,” he says, watching the door close between them.

He stands there, like a weirdo, staring at Victor’s door for a few long minutes, waiting as his brain tears down and remakes his idea of Victor yet again. He knew the Russian man was unpredictable, but he’d never imagined those surprises would be things like this, nuggets of truth that make Yuuri want to crack open his chest and wrap Victor inside until Yuuri’s own ribs curve like a second shield around the man’s heart.

On the elevator ride down to his floor, he pulls up Yulia’s number in his phone.

“Okay,” he says when she answers. “I’m in.”

**Author's Note:**

> Dokidokiniki – doki doki is a term for the sound of a beating heart in Japanese sound symbolism, often used to refer to the reaction you have on seeing a person that you like/crush on. So Yuuri’s secret online handle which he uses for Victor thirst purposes is “doki doki niki"(forov).
> 
> Prince's [Darling Nikki](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GA_FqxZLSMk). In the YOI universe, I assume that fans have made about a thousand gender-flipped versions dedicated to Victor, and that Yakov has had to forbid Victor from using them as his exhibit skate music at least five times.


End file.
